The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan in New York City on 53rd Street between 5th and 6th Avenues. It is one of the leading museums of modern art in the world. The Museum of Modern Art is often considered a rival to the nearby Metropolitan Museum of Art, although the latter is a "universal museum", where modern art is only one area of specialism among many.

The Museum of Modern Art was founded in 1929 by a triumvirate of patrons: Abby Aldrich Rockefeller, Mary Sullivan, and Lillie P. Bliss. At the time, no New York museum was devoted exclusively to modern art. Under the guidance of its first director, Alfred H. Barr, Jr., the museum's holdings quickly expanded from an initial gift of eight prints and one drawing.

First housed in six rooms of galleries and offices in Manhattan's Hecksher Building, the museum moved into three more temporary locations within the next ten years. MoMA's permanent and current home, designed in the International Style by the modernist architects Philip L. Goodwin and Edward Durell Stone, opened to the public on May 10, 1939.


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